


Punishment

by SnufflesWrites



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Angst, Hell, Sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-12
Updated: 2019-11-12
Packaged: 2021-01-29 04:15:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21404020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SnufflesWrites/pseuds/SnufflesWrites
Summary: Lucifer returns from Hell throughout the centuries to better learn how to punish the damned.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 23





	Punishment

One could never escape punishment that was earned. 

Lucifer was the best at anything he set out to do. And when it came to torturing humans in Hell he had one major advantage to all of the demons of the underworld. The ability to walk among them in life.

It started as a need for understanding what he would see in Hell loops. Humans were strange creatures, inventing new things, new rules, and cultures that were hard to understand without the context.

As he visited every generation he learned that his advantage was so much more than simple research into their culture and technology. The good things in their life was stripped away from them in Hell. Here, he could see all that they had left behind. Music, dancing, sex, parties, homes and lives. In Hell he could bring these things back. He could hang it over each soul’s depraved head, and remind them of the things they could never have back.

And when on Earth he would insinuate himself in their desires. Learning everything he could, picking up on the latest fashion, the preferred accent and language, and he would himself become the object of their desire. So that when he returned to Hell, they would see his light, and wish for everything they could never have.

One could never escape punishment that was earned.

Amenadiel saw his trips to Earth, and disapproved. But after a few times when Lucifer insisted only staying for a few days, he warmed to the idea. His little brother was trying, and far be it from him to instruct him how best to do a job he’d never wish on anyone.

It was in the 40’s that Lucifer truly saw Hell on Earth. It was baffling how effectively humans could dole out punishment themselves. He wanted to see how someone could have such cruel intentions on Earth, a place that had the light, and dark. 

So he befriended them. Those souls he was sure to meet back in Hell in a simple blink of his lifetime. He watched their lives become ruined when the allies won the war. And he decided to help them. He moved them all to Argentina, to allow them to live a life with the cruel reminder of their deeds to haunt their everyday. But to build a family, a hope, a longing to do better, only to have it cut off. 

One could never escape punishment that was earned.

He returned in the 70’s. And oh what a beautiful time that was. Disco, drugs, and a love of sexual understanding. But also a time of controversial wars, political leaders, and a desire to bring equality to a world that refused to. He saw the contradictions of people saying their beliefs and doing nothing to support it for an entire lifetime, living in complacency that would surely land them in Hell.

One could never escape punishment that was earned.

It was in the era of the new millenia that Amenadiel called him “evil.”

Evil? For being the best at a job any other angel would never accept? Evil?! For ensuring that those that had done these vile acts would never be able to just walk away after getting their just desserts? But the angel didn’t understand did he? Just as the good parts of Earth were stripped away for Hell, the bad parts were stripped away from Heaven. All the other angels saw were the light, never the darkness.

Perhaps Amenadiel didn’t understand what evil was. Well he’d teach him.

And the angel learned. He learned when Lucifer enlisted Maze to cut off his wings. He learned when Lucifer refused to return. If this job made the one who carried it evil maybe it was someone else’s turn to be evil. 

The angel learned when he brought a psychopath from the pits, and made a deal with him to kill Lucifer. The angel saw the evilness of man when the killer didn’t keep his end of the bargain, and instead decided to go after innocents to send a message.And the angel punished himself, losing his divinity, and had to relearn what it meant to be worthy of it.

One could never escape punishment that was earned.

During his longer stay on Earth, Lucifer realized that was still so much for him to learn. He learned about justice. He learned about compassion. On the Earth he’d banished himself to, he gained true friends that would stick up for him. And most terrifyingly of all, he learned why people sacrificed. He learned to love, and in so doing learned how truly cruel he had been to the universe.

He tried to be good, and watched a friend die.

He tried to be a punisher, and watched as a person he cared deeply for nearly have to suffer a loss herself.

He tried to support his brother in doling out punishment to someone that deserved it after murdering an innocent. Instead of punishing, the angel had looked on the man with pity. 

They’ve lost themselves.

Lucifer was lost. He’d been lost. When the demons rose, he saw that he’d been the cause. Just as he was the cause for the Nazi’s getting away from their sentence. For Pierce nearly killing the Detective, for the death of an officer, and so many things that it felt endless.

His brother was right. He was evil. So he returned to the one true place he belonged.

And he learned of loss. The loss of hope, compassion, family, and love. He learned the feeling of isolation, as he rentered a world that used to bring him joy. 

It was a punishment that not even the worst souls deserved.

But one could never escape punishment that was earned.

**Author's Note:**

> A quick one shot that I had to get out of my system thanks to a dream.


End file.
